MOSCOW - Thirty-seven people's deputies from Ukraine participating in
the current session of the USSR Congress of People's Deputies on December
20 released a statement emphasizing that decisions of the all-union Congress
concerning the union treaty are null and void, as the fate of the union
treaty is to be determined by the people and Parliaments of the sovereign
republics themselves.

The statement was released prior to the Congress of People's Deputies
session that day by a group that included Dr. Yuriy Shcherbak, Oles Honchar,
Dmytro Pavlychko, Serhiy Riabchenko, Volodymyr Yavorivsky, Serhiy Koniev,
Valeriy Hryshchuk and others, reported the Respublika press agency.

In connection with their statement, the 37 Ukrainian deputies said they
would not participate in the sessions at which the union treaty was discussed
or voted upon.